Minneapolitan

Well, assuming nothing goes horribly wrong (always a dicey proposition whenever I bring it up), we are buying a house. We still have inspection, post inspection negotiations, etc to go, but our offer has been accepted. After hunting for a while, we found a house that was the right combination of price, condition, location, and amenities, and it has a lot of gorgeous old woodwork that is in remarkable good shape. It has a two car attached garage that opens into a street, not an alleyway. Most houses in our price range have a detached one car garage without an automatic opener, so this was a good find. It is on a main street, which is a turn off for some people, but here it means that our street will *always* be plowed promptly, which is a big plus. It has a completely fenced in back yard with a nice, relatively new fence, also a rarity at our price point. It has a kind of 70s basement, but it's large and finished. It is close to Lyn-Lake, Uptown, and the lakes, which is pretty much perfect location wise. It's about a 20 minute drive to work for me, less than half of my KC commute, and there is a bus stop *on our block* for Rikki to grab a bus to work. Northern Brewer is opening its Minneapolis store roughly 2 miles to the south this fall. It has a smallish driveway and sidewalk (less shoveling), and a smallish but decent back yard (less mowing, enough space to have a small garden). Walk score of 77 is totally respectable. It's in a safe neighborhood. Inspection is next Friday. We asked for a long close because we need to run out our lease, but the sellers accepted. I am more than a little excited. It's all looking good so far.

Master! Master! Master of Engineering

I finished grad school! I am now allegedly a Master of Engineering in Computer Engineering. It felt rather anticlimactic to finish as a distance student given that I didn't attend the graduation ceremony, but it's good to be done at any rate. Hopefully I can parlay this into a raise or promotion or something. Now if only my diploma would arrive...